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Iron is the outlier at 1538 °C (2800 °F), [21] making it far more difficult to melt in antiquity. Cultures developed ironworking proficiency at different rates; however, evidence from the Near East suggests that smelting was possible but impractical circa 1500 BC, and relatively commonplace across most of Eurasia by 500 BC. [ 22 ]
Most early processes in Europe and Africa involved smelting iron ore in a bloomery, where the temperature is kept low enough so that the iron does not melt. This produces a spongy mass of iron called a bloom, which then must be consolidated with a hammer to produce wrought iron. Some of the earliest evidence to date for the bloomery smelting of ...
The pig iron was melted in a running out furnace and then run out into a trough. This process oxidized the silicon to form a slag, which floated on the iron and was removed by lowering a dam at the end of the trough. The product of this process was a white metal, known as finers metal or refined iron.
Cast iron development lagged in Europe because wrought iron was the desired product and the intermediate step of producing cast iron involved an expensive blast furnace and further refining of pig iron to cast iron, which then required a labor and capital intensive conversion to wrought iron.
In the iron and steel industry, direct reduction is a set of processes for obtaining iron from iron ore, by reducing iron oxides without melting the metal. The resulting product is pre-reduced iron ore. Historically, direct reduction was used to obtain a mix of iron and slag called a bloom in a bloomery.
Most of the iron in the crust is combined with various other elements to form many iron minerals. An important class is the iron oxide minerals such as hematite (Fe 2 O 3), magnetite (Fe 3 O 4), and siderite (FeCO 3), which are the major ores of iron. Many igneous rocks also contain the sulfide minerals pyrrhotite and pentlandite.
A bloomery is a type of metallurgical furnace once used widely for smelting iron from its oxides. The bloomery was the earliest form of smelter capable of smelting iron. Bloomeries produce a porous mass of iron and slag called a bloom. The mix of slag and iron in the bloom, termed sponge iron, is usually consolidated and further forged into ...
The advantage of the induction furnace is a clean, energy-efficient and well-controlled melting process, compared to most other means of metal melting. Most modern foundries use this type of furnace, and many iron foundries are replacing cupola furnaces with induction furnaces to melt cast iron, as the former emit much dust and other pollutants ...